“Erika Bourgignon suggests that it involves ‘regression in the service of the ego’ – where the ego-identity is replaced by one of the archetypes resonant in the unconscious psyche, projected outward as one of the Loa. We can look at this in another way from the framework of cognitive science: AI pioneer Marvin Minsky, in his Society of Mind, suggests that the self really consists of multiple interacting intelligences.”
Legba
“In the Haitian pantheon, each loa or divinity has its associated veve, or mystical diagram. This diagram is drawn with white chalk in order to invoke the entity. Modern observers of veves have often noted, with some surprise, that their intricacy first reminds them of circuit diagrams. […] This is interesting because, in Haitian folk belief, these designs are drawn on the ground, precisely because they believe that geomantic force flows through the conduits of the image. Veves represent a “technology of the spirit” – the houngan is a first-rate semiologist, for he understands the ways symbols mediate between the numinous (the absent) and the material (the present.)”
Damballa Weddo
“In many areas of postmodern/cyberpunk life, we are seeing a curious collision of the past and future, perhaps to form ‘modern primitive.’ There is a reawakened interest in the marking and inscription of the body, an important feature in Voudoun ritual. Neopagan ‘zippies’ go to Raves to hear ‘ambient’ music, a curious fusion of techno-industrial music with sampled ‘New Age’-like sounds from nature and ‘world beat’ music from preindustrial cultures around the globe. Ravers take MDMA or ‘ecstasy,’ a drug which they claim puts them into a form of Levy-Bruhl-like participation mystique. Certainly, the rapid rhythmic beat of the Rave is an important ingredient in the experience; one that makes it very similar in many ways to the Voudoun ceremony, where shifting drum rhythms drive most of the exterior and interior activity.”
Steve Mizrach
Baron Samedi
Nago Shango
Roccioletti 